Kaylee's POV
"Will-" Dr. Joseph's voice was heard clearly from where I was eavesdropping once again.
"You don't-" Will paused. "You don't understand." He finally muttered.
"Will, will you please sit down so we can figure this out together?" There was a plea to Dr. Joseph's voice. I wondered what was so urgent.
Will laughed. "Figure out what?" he scoffed. There were slight shifting movements that were heard after that.
"This has happened one too many times. Will, you could've died last night. It was a miracle that Louis even found you and got you checked out. I'm just worried-" he stopped talking suddenly, and I silenced my breathing to hear Will's response.
It was quiet before Will said, "Maybe I should've."
The door swung open roughly then, and almost hit me in the face. I jumped back and Will caught my eyes for a second, before turning his face away from quickly, and jostling past me. But I had seen what I already had already seen.
His lip was cut in all the wrong places, his face bruised badly, and small cuts and more bruises covered his arms like tattoos as he tried to cover it up with a blue jacket, but of course it couldn't hide everything. I leaned myself against the wall behind me, trying to steady myself. I never did well when I saw things like that.
I had already seen Chance one too many times like that. It always happened sometime in school when some guys decided that because he couldn't love girls, because he loved someone his own gender, that he wasn't human. But Avery always had his back, and I had his, too, because he had ours.
I slowly made myself breathe in and out, before using the wall as guidance to slip into Dr. Joseph's office for my appointment. I didn't sit, but stayed leaned against the wall for support. I was feeling dizzy now, my vision blurred in and out, before Dr. Joseph quietly said, "Go. I have a feeling you know where to find him."
Thanking him quickly, I made my way out the front door and found myself running. He was right; I did know where to go. Turning this way and that, I found myself down the familiar path that Will had only just shown me yesterday, and slowly made my way down the slope leading down to the creek.
Halfway down the slope, I saw him. He stood out really, with his dark colored clothing among the whiteness of the snow blanket, and the way he moved slightly. As I looked closer, I realized that his feet were in the water, and I completely stopped thinking. Stumbling the rest of my way down, tripping as I went along, I made my way towards him clumsily.
Before I even reached him, he said, "It hurts. That's what makes everything feel better." How he knew, I didn't know, but slipping my fingers into the water, my fingers froze and became numb immediately.
I nudged him to remove his feet from the freezing water, but he shook his head, and turned away from me once again. I hated how he always did that.
Fine. If he was going to be this stubborn, I was going to be the same with him. Slipping my warm boots off, and taking off my socks, I reluctantly jammed my feet into the freezing water. A surge of sharp coldness went through my body, and I wanted to pull my feet out, but I didn't. My teeth began chattering, as I tried to rub warmth back into my arms. I decided on trying to concentrate on something else other than freezing to death, because this was for Will's sake, whether he knew it or not.
When I guess he felt the water move other than its usual pattern, he turned to look at me, giving a shout in surprise.
His cold breath mixing in with the coldness of the air formed a fog as he whisper-yelled at me, "Kaylee! Get your feet out of the water! You're going to catch a cold!" he tried to get me to move, but I held my ground because he held is.
I shook my head and tried to feel my toes. Nope. I couldn't feel anything anymore.
Just as I thought I was about to die from hypothermia, Will jumped up and his bare toes made contact with the snow. I winced as I thought about how that must have felt. Arms were under my armpits now, pulling me out of the water swiftly, but instead of setting me down on the snow, he set me down on his toes gently, while he tried to grab at my shoes and socks without actually letting me make contact with the snow. I found it absolutely adorable how he was trying to do two things at once. Finally his fingers grabbed at my shoes and socks and tugged it over to me. I grabbed the socks from his hands and quickly put them on, my feet accidentally making contact with the snow. I shut my eyes before altogether stepping on the snow and throwing my shoes on because it would've taken a while to put them on the other way.
Even after my shoes were on, I still found myself trembling unwillingly, as Will put on his shoes as well, tugging me back up the slope again and onto the sidewalk. We kept quiet the whole way back, as I walked in the direction of my house with him following me, but I didn't mind too much. It was nice to have company once in a while.
I stared at him out of the corners of my eyes, and he seemed to be lost in thought, before he shrugged off his coat and settled it over my shoulders, decreasing the level of my shaking body. Now he was in full view and I could see everything he was hiding underneath that coat of his.
More bruises and cuts covered him; jagged scars covered him from previous times of maybe some fight, and it made me realize just how broken he was. I stopped walking and he did as well.
For some reason, I found myself wanting to scream at him. Scream at him because he wasn't hiding all of this away to himself; scream at myself because I didn't know about any of this, because I felt like I should've known.
Will stuck his hands into his jeans' pocket, staring at the cement pavement, a new found interest of his, and said nothing.
Strands of my hair, wet slightly from the air, flew in my face, but I ignored it, walking on, and leaving Will a few steps behind me. Soon, my house was just in front of me, as I pulled the house key out of my pocket and slipped it into the keyhole.
Entering, I made a hand gesture at Will to follow me. Sighing, he walked in past me and into the warm house.
I closed the door behind me, making sure to lock it, and walked in behind him. He made aim towards the couch in the living room, but I wrapped a hand around his cold one and made my way upstairs. Walking down the short hallway, I stopped at my room and he followed in.
I pointed at my bed, trying to communicate to him to sit, and he obeyed, reading my mind like a genius again. Even that was a skill that Avery hadn't learned to master.
I disappeared into the bathroom for a minute, and returned with a warmed towel from the hot water I ran in the sink.
"What-" Will began as I dabbed the towel on his biggest cut on his cheekbone. He flinched, pulling back from me, but then stopped, giving into me and the warm towel.
As I worked, he began to talk, "I should've died last night," he murmured. I gave him a weird questioning look and he went on with a bitter laugh, "They found me again, like they always do..." he trailed off and maybe I was just dreaming it up, but there was flashes of a million words in his eyes right then. And somehow, I understood everything they meant.
I finished working my way down his cheeks and he closed his eyes. His now warmer breath was on my hand when I heard Chance's voice at the door, taking off his shoes loudly, "Hey Kaylee! So I was at that coffee place and there was this guy, damn I didn't get his name, but not the point. He was there and we..." he walked into the room and froze.
"Chance!" Avery screamed. "Gah! You just made me spill that coffee all over my..." she trailed off as well when she reached my room. I gave them both a small smile and turned back to a Will with a wicked grin on his face.
"What's he doing here?" she asked bluntly.
I stared at her, telling her mentally to shut up, and wishing she could read my mind as well as Will did, but Will started talking, "What are you doing here?"
"I basically live here." She crossed her arms.
"Yeah? And-" Will began, but Chance cut him off.
"Hey! Does anybody want to finish hearing about that boy-" he begins, this time Avery cuts him off.
"Alright pretty boy, you want to go?" Avery began cracking her knuckles and I watched in horror as Will got up.
Will turned to me and asked, "Is she fucking serious?"
"Oh hell yeah I am..." Avery snapped back.
"People, please. Can we not settle this over a nice story?" Chance pleaded.
"You know what?" Will said. "Go ahead. Finish your story."
Chance sighed and smiled, "Anyways. He had this mop of brown hair that went in every direction and he had the best smile-"
Will frowned, but then smiled. "That's Louis you're talking about there."
~A/N: This thing with Louis is @IBelongWithTheBrit's idea! :) This chap's a bit longer than the rest because of you amazing people who know where that vote button is. :P So please VOTE, COMMENT, AND FOLLOW!
~Forever_Yours_Too